


Two Rules for the Realistic

by Darkyu



Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Abuse of the f word, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Breaking Up & Making Up, Civil War Fix-It, Divorce, Established Relationship, Hostage Situations, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Jealous Tony Stark, Kidnapped Tony Stark, M/M, Parent Steve Rogers, Parent Tony Stark, Protective Peter Parker, Protective Steve Rogers, Protective Tony Stark, Sort Of, Steve Rogers Feels, Stubborn Steve Rogers, Tony Stark Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-27
Updated: 2020-11-03
Packaged: 2021-03-01 17:22:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 18,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23880757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darkyu/pseuds/Darkyu
Summary: Months after the events of Civil War, Tony and Peter are kidnapped to use as leverage against Steve.What the kidnappers don't know is that Steve is not coming. Tony had filed for divorce a month before all this shit went down and Steve doesn't have any reason to come rescue his past family.Though, Tony can't help but hope that Steve would at least come for Peter.Or: Two rules for the realistic that can help you enjoy life because it means you're alive.
Relationships: Peter Parker & Steve Rogers, Peter Parker & Tony Stark, Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 52
Kudos: 478





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm back after I-don't-know-how-many-years! Again! My life's been busy, but, last night I got inspired by a long comment that someone left in one of my old stories and couldn't help myself.
> 
> For that, I present you the Civil War fix-it (kinda) that I suddenly wrote today because home office means that I get to organise my time and be able to sleep at four am without suffering the consequences the next day.
> 
> Enjoy!

“Keep running off that mouth of yours, Stark.”

He was expecting another punch to the stomach, but when it came it still made him try to shrink into himself and throw out his lungs as all his precious air left him with a chocked gasp.

“It only makes me want to keep you  _ close _ company for longer,” his captor purred sadistically, taking a handful of his hair and pulling sharply his head up so that Tony could see the scarred face on the left side of his face and slightly bent body of his captor over his tied position on the chair, “if you know what I  _ mean _ .”

And... it just got worse when the horrid kidnapper openly leered down at him. 

There was a moment in every smart human being's life when they get a new understanding of how the world works, especially after living to tell the tale after a huge misfortune. To some, it came early in their lives and to other lucky, idiotic people it just didn't happen soon enough.

That explained, there were two facts in Tony Stark’s life that nobody could deny: one, he was a rich genius. Two, money couldn't mean much when his life had been nothing but misfortune after misfortune.

So, it was an overstatement that he had earned a  _ lot  _ of understanding through his greatly difficult life. What had he learned? Two rules in life: First, don’t underestimate people; people have a tendency to overcome themselves to make sure that any situation turns worse than you thought it could get. Second, whatever deity or mystic forces anyone prayed to, the universe will always have a way to pay you back for all the shitty misfortunes that it makes you go through. If this wasn’t true, people would just kill themselves and hope for a better afterlife.

That was more positive than you're thinking, right? That was Tony Stark for you; a sea of complex and fucking positive thinking.

“Of course, I know what you mean, I’m a delight, I’ll do us both a disservice to pretend otherwise.” Tony managed to gasp with a less delighted frown on his face when the man crouched down more to come closer to his face, not letting him pull away from his tight grip on his hair.

How was this his life, again?

Right, it was all rule number two.

Tony understood balance. If his parents haven’t ignored or outright abused him when he was a kid, he wouldn’t be as smart as he is now because he probably wouldn’t have tried as hard as he thought he had to in order to have some kind of recognition. But Tony still loved his parents and they loved him in their own way, so they had to be murdered by a psycho assassin, leaving him all their cursed money to keep creating all of his inventions to try and forget the pain that their death had caused him. Then, if Tony hadn’t been betrayed by his father figure, kidnapped and tortured for months in a cave in the middle of the desert, he wouldn’t have discovered the illegal weapons dealing and Iron Man wouldn’t have been born. If Tony wouldn’t have slept around to try to fill all his life’s voids that were never going to be filled, Peter wouldn’t have been born. And if Tony hadn’t joined forces with a team that clearly hated him at the beginning, he wouldn’t have met and married Steve. He could go on forever.

“I can see what the Captain sees in you, Stark,” his captor said in a mock-whisper as if he was talking to a precious lover, he even had the gall to caress his cheek, “I’m loving your spark.”

“Take your dirty hands away from him, you psycho!” came the voice that interrupted the ingenious remark that Tony was about to make.

Tony’s mind froze the moment he recognized the voice and instinctively tried to turn towards the voice at the risk of his captor ripping out his hair. His scalp burned horribly for a second but, the next, the man shoved his head into the chair as he let go of him in order to pay attention to the new arrival.

“Peter!” Tony exclaimed as he struggled uselessly against the rope binding his limbs to the chair, “You bastards!” he exclaimed frustrated when nothing even budged. He made a quick scan of his son and found with relief that he looked angry but unharmed.

“Dad!” his boy called for him as he was dragged into the room by a couple of thugs, all of them armed. Tony noticed that Peter wasn’t using his full strength in his struggles as he was ‘forcefully’ tied to his own chair placed a few meters from Tony’s own, just to his right and couldn’t help but to feel pride for his genius son’s quick judgement of the situation.

Spiderman was a new, local hero and his identity was still a well-guarded secret, so there was no reason for these thugs to think that Peter could be a superhuman like Steve, as he was widely known as Tony’s biological son. With a quick glance, his boy had understood the situation and acted accordingly; his very human father was tightly tied with rope to a chair and there were at least ten individuals scattered into the warehouse at different vantage points covering all exits, all without any type of mask or disguise to cover their identities, all were heavily armed and most of them aiming at the oldest genius. 

It was easy for the youngest genius to assume that these men meant business and that he would also be tied up with rope or tape that the teen could easily rip to shreds in a second, but his father couldn’t, and neither of them was bulletproof, so the best tactic was to take a metaphorical deep breath and wait for an opportunity to take action. Both Peter and Tony needed more time to count movements, exits and assess the situation so that they wouldn’t be killed on the spot and escape as unharmed as possible.

In moments like this, It showed all the tactical training that Peter did with Steve, Tony had to grudgingly admit.

It didn’t make it any easier to see his son being manhandled by thugs armed to the teeth, though. Even if his son  _ was  _ bulletproof, it probably would not lift the constricting weight pushing down at his stomach at the sight.

Tony got even more anxious when he noticed that all the kidnappers’ eyes were concentrated on his son as he was being tied down to the chair. It also made his fury fire up when he realized that the fucking bastards had seized the opportunity to also snatch Peter when they were probably only aiming for his abduction to begin with, as it was only by chance that Peter had been with him earlier that day (god, he hoped it really still was this morning). Or, more correctly, Peter had had to allow them to capture him when the kidnapping was taking place in order to keep his identity intact and save his old man.

Tony always knew that with his and Steve’s profession as international superheroes, it was only a matter of time when an idiot decided to drag Peter into this. He just had hoped that the time would come after Peter turned fifty or something. Though he was now secretly glad that Steve had (yelled) talked him into preparing Peter for an event such as this, hence, Spiderman was born. Thanks to that, worst-case scenario, at least Peter could leave him behind and save himself if things got out of control.

“What the hell do you want?!” Tony finally decided to drop the ‘chilled’ act and he raged out as he tried to gather all the eyes back on him again, “Whatever it is, you don’t need my son to get it! Let him go and I will do what you say.”

Which was a lie because Tony had perfect faith that Peter could get out of this on his own and his own life wasn’t worth whatever these thugs wanted, but his words were enough to turn all the heads to him immediately. There goes up Peter’s value as a hostage and a nice distraction for his kid to look for a way out.

These idiots didn’t know what they were up against.

Of course, Thug-number-one (also called Scarred-face in Tony’s mind) that had been simultaneously beating him and flirting with him decided to take back the stage along with Tony and roughly grabbed his chin and forced his captive to once again make eye contact.

“Anything?” Scarred-face said, regaining his disgusting leering expression, “Because  _ I  _ have a few ideas of what I would like to do to you as we wait for the Captain to arrive.” This time, he went as far as to undo the first button of his button-up shirt. In front of his kid.

There was a moment of utter shock at the unprecedented scene taking place in Tony’s life. It wasn’t only because of the clear unwelcome sexual advances that this guy was making on him, as disturbing as they were. It was the fact that Tony kept defying his own rule-number one, unconsciously believing that this situation couldn’t get any worse, and then being disappointed in himself when they actually got worse and still felt the hope melting. Fuck the spark of positive thinking that Steve had engraved in him. Another reason to resent him, or maybe Tony wasn’t as smart as he initially thought he was.

Where the fuck was his rule-number-two? For this, though? The fucking universe owed him a  _ fucking lot _ .

Fuck.

“I told you to get your dirty hands  _ away from him _ !” Peter yelled at their captor in rage, but before anyone could notice the recently-tied-in-place ropes around Peter creaking, Tony spoke loudly over him.

“Are you  _ fucking  _ kidding me?!” Tony shouted at the top of his lungs which, really, helped a little to yell the ‘f’ word out loud for a change, though it earned him a solid slap to the face. However, regretfully for the kidnapper, he couldn’t care much about the burn on his face as the dizziness that overcame him was a welcome distraction for what was happening around him. Ironically, it also made him concentrate on the real issue at hand, “Steve?!” he asked incredulously after he spat the obstructing blood out of his mouth when he noticed that he had cut the inside of his cheek with his teeth, “You’re keeping us here as leverage against Steve?! Are you insane?!”

As Thug-number-one processed that, Tony tried very hard not to look at Peter, who was probably as confused by this turn of events as he was.

Steve’s topic was still a sore one for Tony and Peter. His son had never thought it possible that his other father would ever choose Bucky over his husband, but when it actually happened to the point where the supersoldier left Tony to die in fucking Siberia, it crushed Peter’s admiration for his pops. 

Of course, Tony had tried time and time again to make it clear to Peter that the one that Steve had abandoned was him and not his son. Unfortunately for Tony, Peter was already sixteen, a local hero, and crafty enough to convince Rhodey to take him along in his quest to look for the missing Tony and Steve when ‘the superhero civil war’ took place. Rhodey had been at the time recuperating for the fight with Steve’s criminal gang and dealing with the loss of his legs, so he had decided to take Peter as back up. Three days later, they had found Tony. The sight of Tony dying from the cold and starvation in the middle of a Hydra base while clutching at Steve’s shield was a sight that Tony had failed to spare his kid form, and it seemed to have greatly affected his relationship with his stepfather.

Tony knew for a fact that Steve had tried to contact Peter a few times along the seven months that he had been gone, but Tony wasn’t sure if Peter had actually answered. It wasn’t Tony’s place to ask him, though, not if he was trying to avoid making his kid think he had to take a side or saying something that could take a huge hit to his teenager’s self-esteem for abandonment issues; he was a smart kid, he would immediately sense the resentment in Tony’s voice if he spoke of Steve, good or bad. Peter would have to talk to him on his own volition when he felt ready.

For his part, Tony had held pathetically onto the untraceable phone that Steve left him in hopes that he would call him to apologise for every shitty thing he did to Tony during his quest to get Bucky back. Of course, he didn’t tell Rhodey or Pepper that he still had the phone tucked somewhere in the back of his socks’ drawer and that he charged it from time to time so he could check if he had received a new message or call.

He would deny it until the day he died, but he knew that he still loved Steve even while he finally decided to sign and file his divorce papers a month ago. But it had been time to let Steve go and think about himself and his future with his son that didn’t involve an international criminal as a husband and a father.

“It doesn’t matter what you do, Steve won’t come,” Tony said with all the conviction he could muster. It probably should hurt Tony to believe it so much, but it was the harsh truth that he had finally accepted.

Amused, the kidnapper didn’t seem to believe him and seemed to take his words as a fun way to pass time, “Really? And why is that? You’re his only family and he knows  _ very well  _ that we don’t kid around. Even if he trusted you to handle us as Iron Man, it would be clear by now that you don’t have any of your armours to help you and, even if you did, nothing outside of AIM technology can be used in this warehouse.”

“AIM?” Tony asked, glad that this moron was finally oversharing, “So you’re with AIM?”

“Just because I like you  _ very much _ , I’ll tell you, Stark,” Scarred-face acted as if he was thinking about compromising as he undid the next button down of Tony’s shirt to the genius’ dismay. Tony was glad that Peter could keep his cool as he dug answers out of this idiot, “AIM and us only have shared goals at the moment, but we are proudly from another, better organization.”

As if their captor had made some kind of cue, every criminal present intonated at the same time their hymn, “HAIL HYDRA!”

Tony could hear Peter’s snort of outrage. At least, he was trying to be discrete and not gather attention to himself.

“How cute. You guys practice every morning at breakfast? Do you have your own boy-band?” Tony quipped and was miraculously spared of another punch as Thug-number-one chuckled in amusement. Tony suspected the fucker was actually taking a liking to Tony that could only lead to dread and disaster if something wasn’t done soon.

But this was worse than Tony thought. If they were dealing with AIM, they would probably want something from Tony’s genius, but Hydra’s intentions were not so easily predictable. If they wanted Steve, they would settle for nothing less and they would kill at least one of them to get him where they wanted and avoid the burden of looking after two hostages.

Besides, AIM or Hydra; they could only mean that the place was swarming with way more brainless soldiers than the ones he could see.

But why would AIM help Hydra? They had little to gain in taking Steve out.

Then, it all made sense to Tony, “So you octopus-fanatics want to kill Steve and then give me to AIM as payment for their help, right?  _ That’s  _ the deal, that’s why you kept us alive.”

“You really are smarter than you look, Stark,” the man replied without surprise, “It’s probably because you’re too sexy and can be easily confused as just a pretty face.”

Ignoring the jab, Tony tried to reason with his captor, “If you need me, then you don’t need Peter, why take him? Just let him go, he’s harmless to you.”

“Because we’re known to get ahead of ourselves while playing the hostage game, or any game we’re playing, really, so there’s always room for a plan B, Stark,” The man explained. When Tony’s eyes narrowed in a murderous frown, their captor had the gall to laugh at him, “Don’t worry, Stark, I don’t really enjoy playing with kids just out of diapers. Though, to be honest with you, we are going to shoot him as soon as the Captain gets here as payback for all the trouble he had made us go through till now, you understand.”

_ No. _

Panic overcame all of Tony’s senses to the point where he felt his heart skip a beat and his breath choking at his throat, refusing to come out. He looked at Peter’s wide-eyed face and the genius felt as if his throat was never opening again.

_ No, please, anything but that. _

“Wait. No. Please.” Tony choked out. He tried to keep his calm before he made the situation worse, “There must be something I can do,  _ anything _ , you can’t kill him, he is just a kid that has nothing to do with this.”

“Nothing to do with this?” asked their captor even more amused at the panic he was causing his new toy, even going as far as caressing Tony’s hair in mock-comfort, “He’s Steve Roger’s son, there’s no more reason needed.”

“I’m not,” Peter cried out, deciding to make his presence more noticeable. He probably couldn’t take the fact that that disgusting criminal was touching his father anymore, “He abandoned us months ago when all of this started, we don’t even know if he is still alive!”

“Peter!” Tony tried urgently to stop him. This was bad, his teenager was finally losing his cool under the pressure of the situation. However, they couldn’t give his captors any reason to kill them, to kill  _ Peter _ , without an escape plan. As smart as his kid was, this was the first time something like this had happened to him and the kidnappers were all over the most hurtful subject for Peter.

At least, hearing Peter’s voice allowed Tony to take a real gasp of air and get his brain functioning again. His son was not harmless. He was not going to get killed that easily.  _ Breathe. Get your head in the game, Stark _ .

“Having us here helps you  _ nothing _ ,” the teenager spat, “He’s not coming!”

There was a short silence as their captors contemplated Peter’s words.

“There are only two options:” Scarred-face finally said, unfreezing the rest of the hydra soldiers who suddenly seemed even more amused by Peter’s declaration, “You’re either lying, or you really believe he’s not coming, in which case it makes keeping you here utterly useless.” At his words, the original pair of thugs that had tied Peter to the chair raised their weapons against Tony’s son.

“Wait!” Tony thought desperately for a way to keep the guns away from Peter, or at least a way to distract them so that Peter could take the opportunity to escape. Tony be damned, this had gone too far, “That’s true but also not true. In reality, Steve left only me for his lover, not Peter. He doesn’t love me anymore; he even tried to kill me. I’m useless for your plan to bring him here. If you kill me, you make him a favour, but he still loves Peter as a son. If you kill him, there is no way that he’s coming!”

Thug-number-one considered his words for a moment.

“Well, actually, what you say makes more sense, considering Pierce’s notes,” Scarred-face disclosed with a smirk. Tony couldn’t help but to wince thinking that maybe all of this was part of Pierce’s sadistic game to make him and his family suffer, “Besides, I would very much rather have you all by myself for a while before I deliver you to AIM,” he finished while licking his lips and roaming Tony’s body with his eyes. Fuck, even the hydra soldier that was beside Thug-number-one seemed uncomfortable from  _ that  _ gaze, “But, I promise you, Stark, if the Captain is not here by tomorrow, I will kill your little offspring and find myself another hostage.”

As if Tony needed a reminder of their situation, he glanced at the guns trained on his son with professional accuracy. He swallowed with difficulty and looked back at his captor.

“That’s impossible!” Tony complained heartily, “Steve is probably hiding on the other side of the world. You can’t possibly have found him to deliver the message already, and even if you did, he would never get here on time.”

“Tch, such little faith in us, Stark,” the man reprimanded with a caress on Tony’s cheek as if he found his antics cute. Fuck this guy. Tony tried to shove him with his head to no avail, “The Captain has been trying to get into the country for the past month or so,” the revelation earned gasp from Peter, it probably rose his hopes up even if he wouldn’t admit it, “and we need him here for our plans, so we indirectly helped him to get in through one of our cover agencies. He either didn’t notice or, if he knew, he was desperate enough to go through with it, anyway. He escaped us when he was sure it was a trap, but he managed to enter the country all the same. We don’t know exactly where he is, but he is in New York and we made sure  _ he  _ got the message and not your merry band of superheroes. So it’s him coming or no-one at all.”

Peter and Tony looked at each other with concern. Peter was probably even concerned for Steve’s wellbeing at the news, or was that Tony? Tony seized the opportunity to discreetly nod at Peter with what he hoped was a clear message, “ _ Run as soon as you get the chance. Leave me and look for help. _ ”

Peter probably didn’t get all that from a nod, but for all the time they spend together in the lab, foreseeing easily what tool the other needed next, clearly gave his son enough Tony-guessing-powers to understand the general idea because he immediately and indiscreetly, he may add, shook his head no with a definite, stubborn frown, clearly saying something along the lines of “ _ With that  _ perv _? You’re out of your  _ mind.”

That was all Steve, damn it. If they died, he was going to haunt his ex-husband forever.

“Well, it seems we told each other everything that we could share,” Scarred-face said casually while pacing around Tony. He put himself behind the genius, just enough to his left so that the man could stare directly into Peter’s furious eyes. Tony tried not to move a muscle for Peter’s sake and tried to ignore him, even when the man was getting closer and closer, feeling his disgusting breath over his neck and making him unable to suppress the disgusted shiver that passed through his body.

“Don’t you dare touch him,” Peter warned in a dark tone that Tony had  _ never  _ heard from his son before. One thing was the ‘you’re crazy, Tony’ look he often got from the people in his life, but Tony couldn’t help but feel surprise when for the first time his kind-natured boy suddenly looked like the spitting image of a familiar enraged supersoldier in a mission to destroy and cause pain.  _ That  _ image Tony had had seen up close. Even the couple of hydra soldiers pointing the guns at him did a double-take of what they initially thought was easy prey. They didn’t have the sightless how right they were but, then again, Peter wasn’t bulletproof and he needed to wait to look threatening  _ after  _ the thugs aimed their guns somewhere other than at the teen.

However, Thug-number-one seemed delighted by the fire burning in Peter’s eyes but instead decided to ignore him, probably in a sick game to see if he could get him even more furious.

“Look at him,” he taunted at Tony in a fake whisper, making sure that Peter heard every word, never severing eye contact with the teenager, “All alive and unharmed because you asked so nicely, didn’t you, Stark?”, his right hand went slowly over Tony’s back until it swayed over his right shoulder, mock-embracing Tony. The genius closed his eyes and tried to ignore him again; he was just being used to upset his kid, and he didn’t want to participate any more than what he was forced to. However, he was doubting his success rate when the fucking bastard used his left hand to caress his chest, just over the opening that he created while unbuttoning his shirt, “You did say  _ ‘anything’ _ , right darling?” he purred.

“You!” Peter growled enraged, Tony could hear his self-control snapping along with a stronger creaking coming from the ropes.

If Peter broke free from the ropes in a fury right now, at least one of them would get killed instantly.

“Peter!” Tony called firmly for the kid’s attention. When his father’s voice finally snapped the boy out of his hate-staring contest with Scarred-face, Peter looked at Tony as if startled, and Tony took advantage of that to comfort his son, “It’s fine. I’ll be fine.”  _ Stay safe _ ,  _ wait for an opportunity _ was left unsaid, but he was sure Peter heard it, anyway.

Sensing the hidden meaning behind his words, the teenager fractionally relaxed and probably understood that the more harmless he looked, the sooner he would get that opening, so he even slumped his shoulders in fake-surrender.

Disappointed for the lack of further theatricals, Scarred-face sighed and pulled himself away from Tony, to their relief. Peter got distracted again by the movement and glared at the thug, waiting for his next move. Tony wasn’t naive. If their situation didn’t change soon, he was probably going to be tortured until Steve arrived ( _ if _ he arrived) or worse, raped, which in itself  _ was  _ torture. He just hoped that the Hydra thug wasn’t into torturing younglings and that whatever he was going to do to Tony, he did outside of Peter’s sight. At this point, he would be grateful for any mental scarring that he could spare his son. Time for his son to initiate their escape wouldn’t do them harm, either.

“Take Stark to my room,” Scarred-face ordered the soldier beside him. The hydra soldier nodded first to his leader and then to two other hydra goons that were nearby and in less than a minute, Tony was on his feet, barely being able to keep himself upright with the beating that he had been receiving before Peter got dragged into the open space of the warehouse with him. Not that he could enjoy the illusion of freedom for a second; in no time, his hands were bound behind his back, with a goon on each side squeezing him by his biceps and holding him firmly up. The first one got behind him and put a hand over the back of his neck and a gun to his lower back in order to roughly guide them to their destination. Fuck, any chance for Tony to make a distraction to give an opening to Peter went down the drain when he noticed at least five weapons trained on each one of them, coming from all over the illuminated warehouse, “And take the runt to his cell so that he can reflect on what I’m doing to his father.” Thug-number-one then smirked at Peter in a challenge.

At this, Tony tried his force to uselessly struggle against his captors, “You’re getting what you want, so just leave him alone.” He demanded, but all the fight left him when he saw Peter’s pale facade as he was looking at him with utter fear. When the thugs started moving Tony towards a door that guided further into the warehouse, Peter started trembling.

“No, please, leave him alone,” Peter said in a faint, scared voice, not looking away from Tony.

“Pete, I’ll be fine,” Tony tried, but his words fell on deaf ears as the boy continued to helplessly tremble in what probably was an all-consuming feeling of impotency.

“Please,” he begged.

Thug-number-one laughed at getting Peter to plead for his father, “What happened to your fire, kid?” he mocked, “Don’t worry, I’ll take care real good of your old man.” He taunted.

But Peter still didn’t look away from Tony.

“No,” he repeated, “No, no, this isn’t happening, no, no.”

“Peter-” Tony tried. Peter needed to have more patience; they needed their cover.

“No!” the boy shouted and snapped out of his bounds. What surprised Tony the most wasn’t that the shock of the thugs aiming at Peter delayed the imminent bullet-rain, but what his son shouted next:

“POPS!”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHAT happened? This all started as a challenge to myself to write a 1500-2500 word story, and look at this! Challenge FAILED. That being said, I was going to wait till I reached 100 kudos to post the next chapter, but I couldn't get them before Monday (the promised update date), so this is for the 97 people that kudoed my first chapter! You rock!

“POPS!”

As if waiting for his cue, the lights went abruptly down at the exact same moment that the window nearest to them went shattering in a rain of sharp glass and, a second later, gunfire started going off all around Tony; miraculously the gun at his back was spared from the action. It seemed they weren’t going to shoot at him without a direct order. Nice to know. 

The genius didn’t try to spare a glance towards the commotion, he blindly head-butted the brute on his back, which at least earned him a grunt and the missing feeling of the gun jabbing against his back as the soldier fell with probably a broken nose. Thank god that the gun had had the safety on. Then, Tony tried to force himself out of the grip of the other two, but they seemed less put out at being unable to see and yanked him backwards and away from the flying sparks of the guns firing at where Tony had last seen his son.

His heart stopped for a moment and strained his hearing to try to pick his son’s voice out from all the loud noises of shooting, grunting and the bodies hitting the ground. Before the panic could settle into Tony’s soul courtesy of his wild imagination, the backup generator kicked in and there was light again. Not as glaring as before, but a faint kind obviously made for lasting longer while in emergencies.

Immediately, he searched for Peter and found him stuck to the closest wall, he’d probably barely escaped the first round of bullets and guided himself with his spider-sense. However, Tony could see the two goons that were originally by Peter’s side dead on the floor, an arrow sticking out of their necks.

As he recovered his sight, so did the Hydra and AIM soldiers who came into the open space of the warehouse at the commotion. Without hesitating, they started shooting at everything that moved and looked slightly enemy, including Peter, but their aim was diverted by three more well-placed arrows into the shoulders of the thugs gunning for his son. Tony’s heart (his poor, damaged heart) skipped another beat at the sight.

But Peter didn’t seem to notice or care.

He wasn’t even looking at what was happening around him, he was going straight for Tony in a way that only an enraged and determined Spiderman could, identity be damned. Sensing the danger, the hydra soldier on his left took aim at Peter and fired three quick shots which were no issue for the young hero’s spider-sense and dexterity.

Before Tony could do anything more than to gape at his son in action without his suit, the genius was being dragged back by both thugs that still got their tight grip on him. However, it wasn’t even two steps back that both soldiers were yanked away from him; the first by one of Peter’s webs and the next by the force of two well-aimed knives; the first one went through the soldier’s hand that was aiming his gun at Peter with a sickening sound of cartilage breaking, the other encrusted in the thug’s neck probably before he could even register the pain from his hand.

Tony could barely think about how it was _so not the time_ to remember why he should be _very_ afraid of Natasha, when he was once again dragged into Scarred-face and was reduced to a human shield for the handsy fucker.

In contrast with his former captors, Thug-number-one proved to be a thinker when he stuck Tony’s back to his chest in an effective judo keylock and he didn’t lose any second to put a gun on his temple with clear intent as he took the safety off and quickly covered his back to the wall. It was insane the amount of precaution they got over an injured human with his hands still tied behind his back, he should be flattered, really. All the punching and yanking around had made him dizzy and this hostage thing was becoming tiresome _so quickly_.

Now that he was forced to look at the open space of the warehouse and that his son wasn’t being shot at the immediate moment, Tony could finally take in the scene. Judging by his stance, Peter had frozen mid-step in his one-track mind mission of freeing him and had stopped when he saw their kidnapper put a gun to his dad’s head.

His initial assessment when figuring out that AIM was working with Hydra had been correct; there were definitely more Hydra soldiers than the almost dozen that he originally had counted, and all of them were hands on deck and in full battle mode. 

And in the middle of the fight was Steve.

 _He looks different_ , was his first thought. The red, blue and white were replaced by full-on black. His hair looked darker as if it had toned down the blond sunshine that it used to be in order to match its owner’s transition to a darker life. His now-bearded face did nothing to hide the sharper, unforgiving and full of rage look of the supersoldier. Finally, he held a grey disc as a weapon that matched his dark uniform; similar to his symbolic shield but not quite the same.

The darkness seemed to also take place in his battle style; he wasn’t even pretending that he wasn’t fighting to kill, giving each punch and throwing the full force that the serum provided him with.

Tony felt the air leave his lungs in tormenting relief. Steve had come for Peter. Steve had really cared for Peter in all the ten years that they had been married. Without being able to help it despite the horrible timing, the realization lifted a weight over Tony’s heart and brought a little peace of mind to his nightmares. _Not everything had been a lie_.

“Dad!” Peter called suddenly and Tony snapped out of it when he noticed that Thug-number-one was moving them towards what looked like a well-camouflaged door. Despite his concussion-induced dizziness, Tony tried to move away from his captor, but the hard press of the gun’s barrel into his skull was warning enough. He didn’t want to die in front of Peter, so he would have to dial down the risk-taking until he found a more realistic opening.

Where were the damned rouge-heroes when you needed them?

“One more step and I will kill him, you freak!” Scarred-face sneered at his son without stopping his pace. 

Over the corner of his eye, Tony saw a couple of AIM soldiers aim at his son’s back. Tony recognised the look in Peter’s widened eyes as his spider-sense warned him, but one of the goons had a machine gun, “Peter!”

In a blink, Steve’s disc had hit one of the thug’s head and the other one was being chocked by Black Widow’s tights. However, it was too late, the bullets were already flying and no dexterity could avoid so many bullets at such a close distance. 

Before anything hit Peter, though, Bucky Barnes seemed to miraculously materialise in front of the kid, shielding them from the unavoidable bullets with his metal arm. 

Tony could breathe again. This experience could leave the genius with significant heart and brain damage.

Tony and Scarred-face were only three meters away from the door that was clearly the scaping plan when suddenly his captor stopped. Tony turned for a second to see Hawkeye covering that exit and frustrating his kidnapper’s escape, casually resting against the door as if waiting for the weather to change so he could go outside.

And then, there was silence. Tony took a quick look around the warehouse only to find that the battle was over, at least inside; he paid more attention and he clearly heard a fight still going on outside. Typical; it was taking Steve’s team no time to wipe them all out; acting more like a strike team now than an actual superhero’s team. Nevertheless, Thug-number-one’s grip on him didn’t loosen a bit and by the looks of it, he didn’t have any intention of giving up just yet.

“Captain,” Scarred-face greeted with a pleased smile, as if he felt no pressure from the situation he was in. In contrast, Steve looked murderous and ready to rip him apart limb for limb. Yes, that was exactly the look that Peter had mirrored moments ago that had surprised Tony so.

“Bates,” he returned, walking calmly where Bucky and Peter were standing. It seemed that the situation demanded them to stand over an invisible line that seemed to mark the limit of how close they could get to Tony without ‘Bates’ blowing his brains out. Bates is _so_ not better than ‘Thug-number-one’ or ‘Scarred-face’, by the way. Was it Tony’s imagination or Bates’ scar was shaped like a small hydra? God, Tony didn’t know if his terrible headache was because of the fanaticism or if he’d taken a stronger-than-usual hit to the head; either way, he was definitely fucking feeling it.

“Let my husband go. Now.” Steve ordered immediately. So, _husband_ , huh? Concussion or not, _that_ didn’t make any sense to Tony.

“Or what?”, Bates challenged him without giving anything away, “Look around you, Captain. It seems that you exceeded my expectations and managed to turn my own trap into your ambush in no time, so it seems that I’ve lost. However, I can see that the criminal life has taken a toll on you, and you came here with the clear intention to kill. Just like the Winter Soldier, over there; a synthetic assassin, how nice.”

Barnes just looked back at the man with the same murderous look that had haunted Tony’s nightmares in the last several months.

"Longing, rusted, seventeen...” Bates started to chant, and Tony could only look as Barnes started to lose his control over himself, grabbing at his head as if it was hurting, “...daybreak,-”

“Peter, get away from him!” Tony yelled at his son in terror. No, please, Peter was just beside the Winter Soldier; he was going to kill his son just as he had killed his parents in cold blood, “Now!”

“Bucky, snap out of it!” Steve ordered before anything could escalate as he slapped his friend in a swift movement.

The effect was immediate; Barnes stopped shrinking on himself and listened to Bates finish the enchanting words with even more murderous intent, “That’ll cost you, Ублюдок.”

Bates, however, didn’t seem surprised or even truly disappointed by this turn of events, “How anti-climatic. You can’t blame a fella for trying, now can you?”

Great. They were dealing with a true psychopath. See? Rule number one in all its splendour.

“Bates, I’m warning you, let my husband go. I won’t say it again.” Steve threatened. Peter looked from his stepfather to the villain, to his father, looking by all means like he didn’t have a clue of what to do, but not willing to be the one to screw things up and get his father killed.

“Again, or _what_? You have nothing to threaten me with, Captain, you’re clearly going to kill me either way. Or at least, you’ll try.” Bates answered with way more confidence than Tony was comfortable with, he just made a point of it by embracing Tony to him harder, making sure he didn’t leave any openings to an attack and in the process making pressure on what probably was a bruised rib. Really? Fuck this guy. Though, Steve looked impossibly more murderous by the hydra soldier’s lack of compliance, “Either you keep the kid and let me walk away with your husband-”

“Not my husband anymore, Thug-number-one,” Tony couldn’t help but remind everyone in the room of that _slightly important_ fact. He didn’t want Steve to get any ideas now that it was highly likely that he was going to die. Steve looked quickly at him with what only Tony could interpret as a hurt look, a staggering contrast with all the aura of murdering intent that he had on a second ago, but Tony ignored him in order to keep his concentration on Scarred-face, “So, whatever you’re planning-”

Bates shook him into silence, hustling again his wounds enough for him to gasp in pain, making Steve resume his stare-of-doom, and the Hydra soldier allowed himself to continue as if Tony hadn’t said a thing, “or I will kill him and you will kill me. Nothing else to it. So, either we both die or we both live. I don’t care much which one, mind you. I have been ready to die for Hydra since my enlisting, and what a way to go: taking Captain America’s true love down with me and leaving his only son traumatized? Beautiful.”

Yes, the fanaticism was definitely the main culprit for Tony’s headache, he decided.

His proud, manic expression suddenly changed when his gaze fell upon Tony again, his voice turning seductive and only accomplishing to further anger present company, “And talking about beautiful, I can see why you’d love this sweet-ass,” the crazy man dared to lick the outline of Tony’s ear; it was disgusting in so many levels. The genius tried uselessly to throw him off again --to at least create an opening for someone to stick something sharp in this bastard, anything, really-- but his captor seemed like he hadn’t even noticed he moved, “I only spend a little time having fun with him and we haven’t had the opportunity to _deepen_ our relationship, _yet_. If you know what I mean.” The last sentence he directed at Steve.

Then, Bates looked at the anxious-looking Peter, “The young lad didn’t want to share his daddy, but I’m sure you wouldn’t have a problem with that, right, Captain? I hear you already have a lover. Your loss is my gain and all that.”

Hearing about Steve’s lover from someone else felt like a punch to the gut to Tony. Suddenly, he had to keep his eyes shut as he was unable to withstand the humiliation of realizing that he was so damn weak that his ex-husband and his lover had to come to his rescue. Because he wasn’t strong enough to defend his own son. How pathetic was that? No wonder he got replaced in a beat.

“So? What’s it going to be? We live or we die?”

His ex-husband didn’t seem to think much about it, he just got in front of Peter and spat a threat to his captor, “I am going to kill you, Bates, this I swear,” if possible, Steve’s tone got even darker, but as if cutting off a wire pulling at his arm, he put his shield down and turned to Hawkeye, “Barton, let him go,” he ordered.

“What?!” Peter jumped at the order trying to go round Steve, but he got his son by the shoulder at his side in a smooth movement, “You can’t do that! I won’t forgive you!”

“Peter-” Tony tried to pacify the teenager as Clint obediently moved out of the way with a shrug, but Steve beat him to it.

“Peter,” the supersoldier called firmly, turning to look at his step-son right in the eyes, “You have to trust me. He _will_ kill your father if we don’t do what he asks.”

“But we can’t leave him with that psycho!” Peter shouted out, turning his attention to said smirking psycho who was already safely at the door, “He’s going to get _raped_. If you’re not going to do anything I will, so move!”

“Pete, trust me,” Tony barely managed to hear Steve say, and suddenly, he was breathing fresh air. Well, at least more fresh tan inside.

A massacre had also taken place outside but wasn’t yet completely finished, which seem to distract his captor but for a second. No longer afraid to die in front of his son, Tony immediately took his chance and head-butted Bates with all he got left. Tony got enough leverage to barely avoid the first shot at where his head had been a millisecond ago. Finally, adrenaline was taking over his body and his body was battle-ready in a second. Except, in that same second he seemed to forget that his hands were still tied behind his back, so his victory was inevitably short-lived. He seemed to have missed Bates’ nose and the goon had recovered quickly enough to kick the genius right on the butt before he could turn to face the soldier and he lost his balance. Tony fell face-first onto the concrete that used to be the parking lot of the warehouse and now resembled more a gory cemetery. He managed to turn his body’s weight onto his right shoulder to try and run for it, but it was already too late.

“Shame.”

It was his only warning before Tony heard the shot.

It was impossible to miss at this distance, but Tony knew it hadn’t hit him when there was no additional pain pounding through his wounds and nothing turned into infinite black as he died tragically. He slowly opened his eyes even when he heard another three shots being fired at him. 

As the panic of barely missing death faded a fraction and he was able to pay attention to anything else but the frantic pounding of his heart, he noticed that he was surrounded by a familiar pink magic field and all four bullets were still visible on its wall as they had been interrupted in their trajectory to Tony’s certain death.

The authors of the outside massacre finally appeared. Sam and Wanda were apparently finishing everyone off, making sure nobody could escape, while waiting for them to get outside so she could disarm Bates. After saving his life and ensuring with her magic field that Tony was kept out of reach, she easily used her pink magic to get a hold of Bate’s gun when he turned his aim at her and crushed it into a useless metal ball on the floor with a calm smile on her face. 

Bates seemed to sense just as much as Tony that the women in his life were pretty dangerous and didn’t even try to fight her. He just stood there with an annoyed and twisted smile on his face. Psychopath for  _ sure _ .

However, the Scarlet Witch didn’t make a move to attack him nor subdue him, either. She just stood there watching him without blinking. The Falcon even ignored them and kept working in getting rid of the runners.

“Who are you, bitch? Can’t you see I’m in the middle of wooing Stark here?” Bates exclaimed in annoyance.

“I think you’re too late for that,” She answered simply and for some reason that made Tony a little angry, “And to answer your first question, I’m just the person who is keeping you here until Steve arrives.”

Even before she finished her sentence, Steve appeared from the inside of the warehouse and marched towards Bates with barely contained fury.

“I like to deliver on my promises, Bates, so you better defend yourself,” Steve warned and in a second, he was on Tony and Peter’s kidnapper. 

Tony took the opportunity to straighten up and sat on the concrete to watch them fight, still surrounded by the magic field. Tony had to admit that Bates was a good fighter for a Hydra soldier, but the fight disappointingly was shorter than Tony had anticipated as Bates’ fighting skills were nothing against an enraged supersoldier’s.

Bates barely scored a hit to Steve’s face and, in contrast, Bates had at least two broken bones in the three-minutes-tops it took Steve to subdue the kidnapper. It was a weird sight to witness Captain America in a black uniform, holding in the air a choking Bates by his neck as if he weighed nothing.

Steve didn’t seem to want to delay the inevitable, so he squeezed harder on Bates’ neck and spoke in a deadly whisper, “You signed your death sentence the second that you decided to touch my son and my husband, you Hydra scum,” and with a flick of his wrist, there was a horrible-sounding snap and Bates lay dead along with his fellow Hydra followers and the few AIM goons that had joined.

As soon as the body touched the concrete, Steve turned towards him, “Tony!” he cried out and rushed at him. The puppy look he usually wore around him was finally coming back to his features now that the danger was gone.

Tony finally realized that he had been holding his breath when all the air in his lungs left him in a huge sigh of relief. The magic field vanished and Steve was immediately by his side, kneeling to gently reach his tied hands to cut him loose with a small pocket knife that he took out from one of the many pockets of his new uniform. 

Tony hadn’t felt that his whole body had been slightly shaking until he looked at his trembling, finally free, hands.

It had been too fucking close. Everything.

Steve carefully grabbed his hands and slowly placed a kiss over each one as he helped Tony to his feet. Tony couldn’t figure out if it was because he was entering into shock or if it was because all the head injuries and the adrenalin still running wild in his body, but he allowed it. Even worse, before the genius could understand what was happening, Steve and Tony were clutching at each other in desperation with no intention of letting go. 

He felt a soft kiss on his temple, and some sort of calm overcame him. He allowed himself to feel what he didn’t know (or rather didn’t want to admit) that he had been missing, and a soft sigh left his lips when he heard Steve whisper over and over ‘ _ I’m sorry _ ’s and ‘ _ I’m here _ ’s.

He didn’t stop shaking completely, though; there was only one other thing that could stop Tony’s trembling completely.

“Dad!” Just like his father, Peter seemed to be waiting for his cue to come out of the warehouse and call for him as he was finally allowed outside. 

And then, it all dawned on Tony. His teenage boy was surrounded by bodies that Wanda was sweeping away with her magic, trying to ignore Steve and Tony... and Tony was losing his fucking mind the moment he thought it was a good idea to be hugging his ex-husband instead of comforting his traumatized kid.

He immediately pushed Steve away from him and ran the short distance towards his son, wounds be damned, at this point he wasn’t even sure if he could feel them anymore. Peter met him halfway and they threw their arms around the other, “I’m sorry, Pete. I couldn’t do anything to protect you,” he whispered into his son’s hair.

“Dad, you handled the situation amazingly,” Peter disagreed hotly, “I am the one with all these powers and I couldn’t even save you. I almost got us killed several times. He was all over you and I couldn’t even-” he was sobbing a little over Tony’s shoulder at the end. Tony tucked him more firmly against his neck and squeezed him harder against his chest, his cracked rib be damned. It was a good self-punishment to remind him that Peter was still a kid.

Peter will become an amazing superhero one day. He already was. But Hydra was still a little too much for him and Tony’s heart ached knowing that Peter will blame himself even if he was aware of that much.  _ That  _ Peter got from him, so he’d know.

“You were amazing and brave, Pete,” Tony consoled, “I haven’t been more proud of you than at that moment. I love you, my bug, and I probably would have been beaten to death if you hadn't been there to control my urge to run my mouth free. You saved us, really, I was just behaving out of fear of all your nagging if I didn’t.” Tony joked in hopes of lifting his teen’s spirit even just a little.

Peter let out a choked laugh at that but was openly crying now, so he didn’t answer and instead hugged his dad tighter. The pain was  _ so  _ worth it.

“Pete, Tony, I’m really sorry for all of this,” Steve said, suddenly bursting the little bubble that the geniuses had wrapped around themselves. Tony took a deep breath and let go of Peter as his son pulled himself away to quickly wipe away his tears. Peter was not prone to tears, not even as a baby, and not now that he was a superhero in the making, but he hadn’t had the misfortune of encountering an enemy so keen to rape and murder, especially not someone keen to rape his own father. He was probably still scared to death, but he braced himself and, even if he kept Tony an arm-length away, he recovered quickly enough to shoot a suspicious glance at Steve for the first time. It obviously hurt Steve, but he swallowed it and asked, “How’re you holding up, kiddo?”

“I’m peachy, but...” Surprisingly, it was his kind-heartened Peter who asked the question that Tony himself was too afraid to ask: “What are you doing here?”

As Steve shot his patented kicked-puppy-look at his son, Tony noticed that his little team of rouge heroes (could he still call them  _ heroes _ ?) gathered around them, but not too close as if trying to give them the semblance of privacy. Come on, who they thought they were kidding? it was obvious they could hear them just fine.

“Peter, how can you ask me that?” Steve asked a little baffled, “Of course I came for you, both of you,” he added, looking directly at Tony so that there would be no mistake of which pair he was referring to.

“That’s rich, coming from you, Rogers,” Tony replied dryly, he knew he shouldn’t encourage Peter’s harshness to his other father, but damn, there was just too much venom gathered in Tony’s heart that had been consuming his thoughts all these hellish months to ignore, “and I don’t want to hear your bullshit. It’s enough that you came for Peter, thank you for that. Let’s leave it at that.”

“Tony, of course I came  _ for you and Peter _ , that can’t be left in doubt, you are my husband and my son,” Steve clarified with new rigour. 

“Ex-husband,” Tony clarified sourly. Didn’t anyone listen to him anymore?

“That is not true,” Steve denied vehemently, “I didn’t agree to any divorce nor was I summoned for a divorce trial, so whatever you think you did to divorce me, it has to be illegal.”

So, this was when things were going to get ugly. Fine by Tony. But first-

“Peter, you should get inside and look for a phone or something to ask Rhodey or Pepper to come to pick us up,” Tony tried as he turned to Peter with a pleading voice, even though the genius knew there was zero chance of Peter leaving him and Steve alone to fight in peace.

“That’s cute, dad, but I am  _ not  _ a baby and can handle you guys fighting, you know?” Peter replied stubbornly, doing that Steve-like thing when he locked his jaw. Damn.

Steve contemplated his teenager’s stubbornness and sighed in acceptance. He probably knew that getting Tony alone and to  _ talk _ to him on another occasion would be a very difficult task. Steve knew him too well to realize that the moment they parted ways the genius would put his literal and figurative armour on and avoid his ex-husband like the avoidance champion that he was.

“Fine.” Both parents said at the same time, startling a little at each other. To break the spell, Tony decided to scoff dramatically and continue antagonizing Steve.

“So what? You came to give me your signature willingly?” Tony asked sardonically as he decided that he wasn’t going to hold much back even if Peter was there. Peter was almost seventeen and Tony couldn’t shield him from everything, as proven by the events of that day, “It wasn’t necessary, Steve, surprised as you may be, I don’t need your approval or your signature when you’re an international criminal hiding from the law. Hell of a legal process, though. I’m glad it’s over.”

“How can you say that?” Steve asked imploringly, “I would never divorce you willingly, Tony, you have to know that.”

“Don’t you fucking worry,  _ if  _ you ever regain legal standing, I left you a fair amount of money to live by comfortably till you die.” Tony knew he was shooting a lot of low blows, but Steve really deserved them and if he didn’t cut loose of his ex-husband now, it’ll be ten times worse in the future.

Of course, that comment turned on Steve’s fury-switch the second the word ‘money’ left his lips.

“How dare you believe-?!”

“That you only wanted me for my money?” Tony asked sardonically, “Oh jeez, I wonder how?!”

Steve looked like he wanted to escalate things to a new level. Tony had always had the power to rile him so much, so fast. Surprisingly, though, Steve stopped, took a deep breath and dialled down his tone before answering, “Tony, you know that I don’t want any of your money. You also know that I love you. Always had and always will. I don’t want a divorce, let’s talk about this.” He proposed instead.

“So what? When it’s convenient to you, you  _ love me _ ,” Tony spat the words as if they offended him, “but when it’s not, you can choose your lover over me, make me clean after your international crimes and leave me to die alone in the middle of fucking Siberia for  _ days _ , barely being able to move, much less make my fucking heavy suit work. You left me to starve and die from the cold, just to be rescued at the last moment by my best friend and  _ my _ son? How cynical can you be, Rogers? You never really loved me. It’s over, anyway, at least have the decency to fucking admit it.”

“What-?”

“I don’t want to see you ever again, Steve,” Tony announced with a calm fury that he had earned from countless nights tossing and turning in bed, trying to figure out where he had gone wrong. Not anymore, “I’m thankful that not everything was a lie and that you care for Peter enough to have come here, so if you want to see him more, I trust that he is old enough to make his own choices; but, you and me? We’re over. Done. Adiós.”

“Tony, no, wait,” Steve immediately stood on his way as Tony moved as if to go into the warehouse, “You can’t leave me like this, please. You aren’t making any sense. I know I screwed up, I know that, but I don’t understand half of the things you just said there. First of all,  _ lover _ ? I would  _ never  _ cheat on you, how can you ever believe that? Whatever you think happened, it  _ did not _ .”

“Steve, we all know that Bucky is your lover, sorry,  _ boyfriend  _ now that you don’t have a husband, anymore.”

“Don’t say that,” Steve pleaded while looking imploringly at Tony, “please don’t say that, it isn’t true.”

“The ex-husband part or the cheating on me part?” Tony asked without mercy.

“Both aren’t true, Tony,” denied Steve with all his might, “That’s why I’m back. The moment I heard of your intentions to divorce me, I  _ had  _ to come back and talk to you. I was wrong to lie to you, sweetheart, but this can’t be it for us! You’re my  _ it _ , Tony, there hasn’t been or will be anyone else for me, please believe me. Don’t leave me.”

“How can you say that after everything you’ve done to us, to this family, to  _ me _ ?” Tony asked incredulously. However, a small part of him, a traitorous part, couldn’t help but to replay the eco of Bates’ ghost moments ago: ‘ _ he was desperate enough to go through with it, anyway _ ’. Had Steve really tried to come back to stop their divorce from happening? Why now?

Then, he remembered the earlier display that proved the remarkable improvement of Barnes’ state of mind, and there was also Steve’s tech-advanced grey disc.  _ So, they were in Wakanda trying to heal Barnes before setting him free, huh? _

Again, it seemed that everything revolved around  _ Barnes _ and  _ his _ needs. Fuck this shit. Tony couldn’t help but to throw a nasty glance at the Winter Soldier that was openly gaping at him. Tony bet that Bucky didn’t know that he knew about his affair with Steve. How dumb did these people think he was?

“Tony, we fought because I lied to you and because of what I had to do to try to save my  _ friend _ from being murdered by you. And I know this is all my fault, okay? I’m not trying to say otherwise,” Steve admitted still with a pleading tone, which was the only reason Tony didn’t immediately reply on the murder comment, “I know I didn’t trust you enough and I should have talked to you when I started suspecting that the Winter Soldier killed your parents,  _ I know now _ . I also know that I tried to tell myself that I was hiding it to protect you, but I was just a coward and I didn’t want to hurt you. I also didn’t want you to hate Bucky when it  _ wasn’t  _ his fault.”

“Oh, I understand now,” replied Tony sarcastically; he was  _ so  _ done with this conversation, “then go away and live your life with your innocent ‘Bucky’, Steve.”

“Tony-”

“No,  _ you  _ had your chance to choose, and you did,” Tony stated with anger, “You decided to leave me to die and go away with him. Now  _ I _ have the chance to choose and  _ I  _ choose Peter and the last shred of self-respect that I’ve got.”

“Tony, there’s nothing between Bucky and I,” Steve said desperately.

“Whatever, we’re done.”

Ignoring Steve’s crushed sight, Tony turned around and went uninterrupted back to the entrance of the warehouse to start looking for something that he could use to call Pepper or Rhodey to go pick them up.

“Tony, wait, please! I think there has been a huge misunderstanding here. Please, let’s talk this out. We  _ need _ to talk about it,” Steve pleaded while going after him, “Please just listen to what I have to say, and I swear I’ll do the same.”

However, Tony was too upset right now to listen to Steve, especially with Romanoff, Barton, Wilson, Maximof and Barnes (fucking  _ Barnes _ ) gaping at him as he went through the little group, “ _ Move _ ,” he ordered with a tone full of threat and the team hurriedly decided to comply and make way for him and Steve, who was still fucking following him.

“Tony, you won’t be able to call anyone from the stuff you will find inside,” Steve tried to reason with him instead, but he finally stopped following him when he reached his clan of friends. Miraculously, Peter had remained frozen in the same spot his parents were arguing on, drinking in all the facts that he could or simply not willing to participate in the dispute just yet, “We had to steal some AIM tech before coming here. T’Challa is coming with the ship anytime now, it will be faster to get you home like that than for you to hack something and wait for help to come.”

Tony ignored him and went inside. It seemed that the group had been busy and had effectively placed the corpses on the far corner of the warehouse. They were probably going to burn everything down as soon as they left. God, he really was dealing with international criminals. And that wasn’t even the worst of his concerns at the moment. How was this his  _ life _ ?

He looked around but couldn’t find a phone or a radio that wasn’t encrypted. Ignoring that fact, and knowing full well that Peter was probably having a much needed conversation with Steve, he decided to give his son some privacy as he opened the AIM radio that he had found on one of the corpses and started looking for a computer of some sorts.

But no matter what he found, Tony’s thoughts were a mess and unable to concentrate on what he could do with the stuff; he blamed it on the possible concussion that he had. However, he knew that seeing Steve after all these months, apologising and begging him to stay as he had never had before, was more brain wrecking than any injury. He  _ knew _ that he would love Steve until his last breath, but he also knew that what happened seven months ago was as far from a healthy relationship that it could get, and Tony had a kid to think about. He couldn’t just go running to what now amounted to an abusive husband just to spare his own feelings .

And all happened because of the appearance of one man.

If that was all it took for Steve to betray him like that, then Steve’s feelings were never true to begin with, and that knowledge just hurt deeper than any hit of Steve’s shield against his armour ever did. Tony closed his eyes and the memory of Steve desperately trying to leave him without his energy source so that he could never leave the base played in his mind.

Eight years of marriage and Steve hadn’t trusted him when it had mattered.

He had tried to kill him.

Fuck. He needed to start getting over this husband thing. After he got home, he was so going back into the market and was going to get some comfort sex, even if he knew perfectly well it was a petty thing to do. Well, at least it always beat drinking.

“Dad,” Peter’s call startled him out of his thoughts as he entered into the control room in which Tony was spacing out, “We have to go, T’Challa is here and he can take us home.”

“Well, I just need a moment here and I’ll be ready to call someone to pick us up,” Tony lied, knowing full well that he was throwing a tantrum. Any excuse not to see Steve again was okay in his book, anyway. -Anything to delay the inevitable

“Dad,” his teenager scolded him gently, “I know how you feel, or at least I understand how you may be feeling, but you know Pops is going to stay here, in the middle of all these corpses, until you come out. Especially because you’re hurt.”

“Once I may have believed that, but he did leave me hurt in the middle of nowhere to run off with Barnes,” Tony disagreed easily.

“Well,  _ I’m  _ not leaving you here in the middle of all this mess by yourself,  _ wherever this is _ ; you shouldn't even be moving; you’re probably concussed,” Peter reasoned back with ease, implying that he was aware of Tony’s twelve-year-old attitude. Sometimes, this brat was way more mature than he ought to, terrible jokes aside. Seeing Steve and himself, he wondered where he got  _ that _ … probably from Pepper, “So? Are we going or are we staying?” his son asked exasperated when Tony remained silent for a full minute.

Sighing and brazing himself for more arguing, Tony stood from where he was pretending to be busy and clasped his son’s shoulder, trying to pretend that each step wasn’t painful at all, “I don’t know what I did to deserve you, champ.”

“Being there for me is enough, dad,” Peter replied sweetly, “and Pops’ got an unforgivable psychotic episode, but we should at least hear him out before making any lasting decisions.”

“You know that the divorce is finalized, right?” Tony asked tentatively, just to be sure that he wasn’t creating any expectations on the teenager, “I really had to open an account on his name and make a huge deposit. The money is frozen by the government, but it’s there-”

“Dad,” Peter sighed as if he were resigned to teach his old father how life worked, “Nowadays, anyone can marry and divorce in a day. But few people have the courage to fight for their loved ones, and that’s what you and Pops stand for, right? It’s the reason you’re superheroes. For you guys? Divorce may just be a fancy word to state to the world that you had a huge fight.”

They  _ did  _ have a huge fight. However, it was way more complicated than that, but he didn’t have the heart to kill Peter’s hopes today; they’ve been through a lot already. Besides, he was just a teenager willing to make an effort to save his parents’ marriage, even when it wasn’t up to him or there was nothing to salvage, anymore.

Still, Peter’s words made an echo in Tony.

‘ _ Few people have the courage to fight for their loved ones _ ’, huh?

At last, Tony and Peter came out of the warehouse to see the group of mischiefs gathering around Wakanda’s equivalent of a quinjet. As if he couldn’t see any of them, Tony approached them with Peter right on his heels.

\---

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, could this be more of a DRAMA?! Still, I hope you liked it! I wanted Steve and Tony to have a conversation right away, but it just wouldn't happen... don't worry, no matter what, I plan to make the next chapter my last one... I'll try VERY hard to not make it longer, especially since it wasn't that popular, hehe, which I understand, cause it was horribly written, really.
> 
> Well, thank you so much for reading this! I'm so happy you took the time. I hope it doesn't take me a long time to finish this (for real this time) soon. Grammar and vocabulary corrections are welcome! Please help out a non-native speaker!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Late but here! Thank you a lot fot the patience. I didn't have as much kudos as I wanted, since I'm still in the 200's, so I guess it means that I kept my promise of when to upload this chapter? No? I know, sorry about the lateness. It is just too hard to find time to do some writing. So, I really hope you enjoy, kudo and/or comment on this story. It will be greatly appreciated (it needs more love). Thank you for the support!

With the scarce dignity that Tony had left, he ignored the awkward greetings from the rouge heroes and went straight for a seat to the back of the ship where the rows of seats were more plaine-like than the front’s tactical seat positioning. He sat next to the window, making it clear that he had no intention of chit-chatting with these bunch of traitors. He had clothed and sheltered them and not once had any of them came even close to thank him for it.

But Tony wasn’t ungrateful; today they had saved his life and, more importantly, Peter’s, so he could now call it even, throwing a bonus of simply not talking to them in order to spare them from his dark thoughts and cynical comments.

Tony realized that his gloomy aura wouldn’t be enough to fend them all off when he saw that Natasha was making a beeline for him the moment that the ship’s gate was closing behind everyone. Damn, it seemed that Peter had been detained by Steve at the front of the ship and wouldn’t come sit beside him on time to block Natasha’s approach.

“Stark,” she called at him as soon as their sights locked.

Tony broke eye contact and simply turned to look out the window in another attempt to throw her a signal to keep going and don’t look back.

“Tony, come on.”

How could he be clearer to these people?

“Leave me the fuck alone, Romanoff.” That seemed clear enough to him.

He could feel her calculating gaze fixated on him, but he had a lot of practice ignoring intense staring, so he just concentrated on the noises that the Wakandan ship was making as it took off.

It was harder to ignore her when she sat right next to him. 

Okay, that was it.

“Do you mind? That’s my son’s spot, so choose somewhere else to sit. Maybe somewhere where nobody minds being stabbed in the back?” He suggested sardonically. Okay, oversharing wasn’t part of his plan, he had meant to grunt or something, but really, he was tired; he just wanted to rest with his kid next to him and leave all these people in the past. Was that much to ask?

There was a tense silence through the ship as people were getting to their seats. Tony was relieved that Bucky chose the furthest seat from him, all the way to the front and next to the exit. Sam stood by the entrance, talking softly to Bucky. Clint took the ship’s controls beside T’Challa and Wanda sat beside Bucky, trying to give the impression that she was not trying to eavesdrop and failing miserably.

Steve and Peter were still standing awkwardly in the middle of the aisle, looking at Tony as if he were a bomb about to explode.

He might.

Natasha, though, decided to ignore him, “You need to get checked out,” she then pointed at the doors at the back of the ship, “We have a medical bay through that door, let me take a quick look.”

“No shit, Sherlock, and thanks, but no thanks,” Tony replied as dryly as it gets, “so now get the fuck away from me so that I can at least rest one eye.”

The jab didn’t seem to stir Natasha one bit, but Tony didn’t think it was going to, to begin with. It felt good, though, but she didn’t stop staring as if by the sheer force of her stare she could make him comply. Not this guy, lady.

“I’m sorry.”

They both knew she wasn’t apologising for stealing Peter’s seat. An apology was  _ really _ something Tony wasn’t expecting from her and it surely showed on his face. They held gazes for what Tony felt like ages. He then decided to forfeit the staring contest and sighed loudly in resignation. It was clear to the genius that if he wanted some peace and be left alone, he would actually have to interact with the rogue heroes.

“Okay, I give up! To ensure that I get out of here alive, let me tell you all I harbour no ill feelings toward  _ any  _ of you,” Tony said out loud and in a pretty sarcastic tone, conjuring all his bullshiting powers onward. They also knew that it wasn’t true, and that was the important thing to feed Tony’s pettiness, “so, let’s say that after today we’re even and leave it at that, deal?” the question was directed at Steve, who only frowned at him, he chanced a quick glance at Peter then and found oh-so-much disbelief. Yep, neither was buying it either, good. “We owe each other nothing. So, to all of you and with all my heart, I can just say: leave me and my family the fuck alone, which in this ship only includes Peter, I must add.”

This time, Tony turned to Natasha, “I don’t need your apology. Now that we’re even, please let’s put everything behind us and just leave me alone. As I told Rogers over there, I’m  _ done _ . With all of you. If you have any complaints or want to talk to me about how you were right and I’m so evil, please leave a message with Friday, she’ll make sure I don’t get it.”

At some point, Tony was sure that he involuntarily took a pleading tone. He wanted to regret it, but something about what he just said got the desired effect as Natasha made to get up. Standing in the aisle, she studied him once and again. Tony closed his eyes in relief and was about to turn his body back towards the window, thinking that it was finally over. Before he could, something stopped him. He snapped his eyes open as he felt Natasha’s callused hands gently grab both of his cheeks to position his head pointing slightly down, and then she placed a soft kiss on his forehead. At this point, Tony wasn’t sure he didn’t imagine when she whispered, only for him to hear, a softer ‘I’m sorry’.

Everything was over in a second.

This time, however, the apology made Tony’s heart constrict in anguish. He couldn’t help but feel a slight burn in his eyes as he remembered that that had been Natasha’s unique way of showing the genius affection all through their now ruined friendship. She had just done it for him and Peter.

The genius decided he wasn’t ready to acknowledge that the apology  _ did _ mean something to her… to him. But, there were too many complications and questions: was it enough? She had not only betrayed him, but she had double-crossed him, and because of that Tony had had to fight Steve and Bucky in Siberia. It was also thanks to her that Tony finally discovered what type of person Steve really was, though.

He really had to think about a lot of things once he had Friday check up on him and had at least 20 hours of sleep.

Talking about sleep, he felt his eyelids falling heavily down and Tony couldn’t remember a reason why he should stop them from doing so.

“...ony! Tony!”

The genius snapped awake by a harsh shake. Suddenly, Steve and Peter were close to his face with a mirroring concerned expression on their faces. Steve seemed to be halfway picking him up; he was crunched on the seat next to him, he had one arm around his back and the other was obviously about to get under his legs.

“I’m awake, I’m awake,” Tony said, shaking his head a little and was just about to push Steve off of him, but the supersoldier saw him coming and swiftly secured his hold and pulled him up in a bridal carry, making Tony grab for Steve instinctively after a wave of dizziness took over his head, “Hey!” he protested, “I’m fine, let me down, right n-”

“Dad, you’re not fine,” Peter interceded before things could escalate going after them as Steve ignored him and headed to the medical room, “At least let  _ me  _ take a quick look, okay?”

His son was asking out of politeness, but they both knew it was an order. Besides, Steve hadn’t stopped one second in his quest of getting Tony to the medical bay, he scoffed and turned to Steve instead to save some dignity, “At least let me down, Rogers.”

“It’s Steve,” Steve clarified without any heat, which was nice for a change, “and sure, I’ll let you down.”

As he said it, Tony realized that they were already at their destination and that he was being let down gently so that he was sitting on a hospital bed of some kind that looked too technologically advanced to be normal. Just the sight of it ensured that Tony would remain awake and maybe salivating a little. He needed to take it apart.

“Uh oh,” Peter said looking carefully at his father after closing the door behind them, “Dad’s got that ‘I need a screwdriver  _ now _ ’ look.”

“Tony, I need you to take off your shirt so I can see more of the damage,” Steve said gently and soothingly. It did little to pacify Tony’s anger, but he begrudgingly complied. While Peter remained in the room, refusing was just delaying the inevitable. Peter went for the computer that seemed to control the bed and started to push and click screens to figure it out while Steve slowly helped him out of his shirt.

“I thought it was Peter doing the check up,” Tony reminded bitterly.

“I will, just a sec,” Peter asked, trying to look like he wasn’t very concentrated in their every word.

“Then, thank you for the ride, the door is right there,” Tony indicated the moment his shirt finally slid off of his body.

“I’m not going, Tony,” Steve explained easily, as if it wasn’t even worth it to voice his statement.

Steve’s assertive attitude had always been such a turn on for Tony in the past. Well, and in the present. However, It was  _ so  _ not the time for the tired and battered genius to let his neatherparts take the better of him.

That’s why, he didn’t know if his witty reply got stuck in his throat because of his indecisive mind or simply because of a natural reaction to his husband.

Ex! Ex-husband, of course. Tony blamed the obvious concussion that he was sporting. 

“Are you okay?” Steve asked, trying and failing to hide a small smile at seeing Tony unable to form words against his rebuttal.

Smug bastard.

“Oh, shut up,” Tony ordered and crossed his arms over his chest defensively, ignoring the pain he felt at putting pressure to his ribs, “I just didn’t want to start another screaming contest.”

“Neither do I, Tony, I swear.” Steve pleaded with his huge blue eyes, “I just want to explain.”

“Explain? What can you possibly explain? I was there, there’s nothing you need to explain,” Tony tried to spit the last word, but his disgust had turned down to pure annoyance. He didn’t have an All-Against-Tony audience anymore, the day was really starting to take a toll on him and maybe, just maybe, he needed to hear Steve out so that he could really move on with his life.

“Apparently there is,” Steve disagreed, but he too didn’t add heat to his words; instead he placed his hands on his forearms and gently tried to uncross them so that he could look closely at the horrible bruise that was forming on the left side of his ribcage, “Tony, we have a lot of things we have to talk about after what you said down there, but I cannot let you keep believing that I cheated on you. And with  _ Bucky _ , no less. That’s like incest to me.”

“Yeah, right, and you did all of that for a  _ brother _ ?” Tony scoffed and before Steve could continue his lies, he added: “Enough that you abandoned your family for months on end to look for? A brother you became an international criminal, fought against your family and betrayed your friends for? A  _ brother _ you decided to ruin your reputation and whole life for? For fucks sake! You even tried to  _ kill me _ for him!”

“Enough,” Steve ordered in his Captain voice, but he was obviously hurt by Tony’s words. Good. “Stop. One thing at a time, please. Tony, Bucky is like a brother to me, always has been, always will be. I lost him in the war because I wasn’t quick enough to save him, even with the serum, and the guilt I had been living with because of that was unbearing until the moment I met  _ you _ . You came to my life and made everything bearable. The fact that I lost my whole world, the fact that I was an outsider in my own city, the fact that I was alone. All of it, it was because I met you that I started to see and to  _ feel _ things other than guilt and regret.”

Tony wanted to say something, anything, to stop Steve from playing with his heart this way. But Steve just kept going as if afraid that once he stopped Tony would disappear forever.

“And then I fell in love with you and everything wasn’t just bearable, but full with colour and  _ hope _ , Tony,” Steve looked directly into his eyes, making sure Tony understood every word he was saying, “You and Peter gave meaning to my existence in this time and, for the first time in my life, I felt like I was  _ living _ .  _ You  _ are the only person I have really loved,  _ you  _ are the only man I have ever and will ever made love with and  _ you  _ are the only being I want to spend the rest of my life with, Anthony Stark.”

“Steve, stop, what are you saying?” Tony asked bemused, his heart was beating so hard in his chest that it made it impossible to blame it on his injuries. It was so  _ Steve  _ to come one moment into his life and mess everything up in a  _ second _ , for the good or for the bad. Tony just hated that he had given Steve this power over him and had yet failed to reclaim it, “Are you  _ hearing  _ what you’re saying? What are you trying to accomplish here? We’re not even married, anymore.”

“We are,” Steve disagreed without hesitance, “but if you insist that we’re not, then take it as a marriage proposal.”

“A marr-?!” Tony couldn’t even finish the sentence. Where did all of his words and sass go?!

“I’m not leaving you alone, anymore,” Stave stated firmly as if that explained everything, “I screwed up big time and  _ I know it _ , Tony, but I want to spend the rest of my life trying to make it up to you.”

Tony had heard that many times before when he was younger. The first memory that popped up would be that of Ty Stone, of course. Thing was, this wasn’t just  _ someone _ , Tony had married Captain America, and he didn’t do a thing with nothing else than a hundred percent resolution. Much less make a promise that he wasn’t planning on keeping till his dying breath. 

Fuck, it was so  _ not _ the time to admire Steve’s tenacity.

But, strangely, a small weight on his heart suddenly lifted. It was really small, though.

“Okay, okay, I don’t think I can deal with this right now, let’s move on from this topic,” Tony asked and tried to dismiss the seriousness of the implications of Steve’s words to conserve some sanity, “Let’s say I believe that you didn’t cheat on me with Barnes, so what? Everything else is forgiven and I just jump into your arms and we go off to the nearest chapel to get re-married?”

“That’d be nice,” Steve replied jokingly, but then he tentatively touched one of Tony’s hands with a soft smile, “But it wouldn’t be us. We have way more fight in our spirits to just ignore it.”

Steve’s smile was getting to Tony. The supersoldier was right; when they had first encountered one another earlier in the night, they were full of adrenalin and still too pumped up not to want to scream their heads off. For some reason, now that they were safe and having Peter in the background calmly looking after Tony, he felt readier for a full-on adult conversation. Even if they were going to scream at each other at some point it would be  _ them  _ being themselves.

It didn’t mean by a long shot that Tony was going to go easy on Steve, though.

“So what then? Are you now going to try and explain why did you leave me to die in the middle of fucking nowhere in fucking Siberia?” Tony spat angrily. He even interrupted Steve’s distracted check-up on his ribs to cross his arms defensively over his chest again, unconsciously trying to protect himself from the heartache that the memory brought him, “You are saying that you abandoned me to look for your lost brother, that you never stopped loving me and that you want us to be together. But how can I even consider going back to an abusive relationship, Steve? You tried to kill me and then left me to die!”

Steve looked at him bemused. Tony could even see in the corner of his sight that Peter had stopped altogether to pretend that he was figuring out the med-bed and was openly gaping at him. 

Tony was never going to let this  _ little  _ fact go, so Peter was going to find out sooner or later. Though, his son probably had had a general idea of what had happened.

“Tony, no, please, I swear nothing like that happened,” Steve almost whispered when he finally found his voice, “Oh god, how can you even  _ believe  _ that?!”

“Again, there is nothing to believe, Rogers,” Tony denied sardonically, “I was there, remember? You fought me to protect you precious Bucky and then, after teaming up against me, you took advantage of the fact that I was  _ actually trying to avoid hurting you _ to win and then decided at the last second to spare cutting my fucking head off my body and go for my life-source instead! Leaving me stranded with no way of moving nor contacting anyone for help, you bastard!”

“What are you talking about?!” Steve asked scandalised, “That’s not what happened, Tony! How can you believe that that was going through my head at a moment like that?!”

“Enlighten me then!” Tony challenged, “there’s no fucking way that your point of view over the  _ facts _ would be so far off from mine that you justified  _ trying to kill  _ me in your head!”

“I definitely did not try to kill you!” Steve sounded more offended than hurt by the accusation.

“The repeated beating on my life-source and almost beheading says otherwise!”

“Of course I wasn’t trying to behead you! And the arc-reactor is not your life-source, anymore. Get that ridiculous thought out of your head!”

“So now I’m being ridiculous for being mad at your cheating and your killing intentions!”

“I  _ did not _ cheat on you and I  _ definitely  _ didn’t try to murder you.” At this rate, Steve’s jaw was going to get stuck in that position.

“Then what the fuck was that, Rogers!?” If Tony only had his gauntlets on…

“I was just trying to protect you both!” Steve yelled desperately. He said it so earnestly that Tony had to stop the screaming contest for a second.

Not that the silence could last long with this kind of conversation.

“Well,” Tony said in a lower voice; tone full of poisson, “that’s when everything went wrong, didn’t it? I don’t need your protection, Rogers, so next time make sure that you land the last blow and finish me off to prevent all this bullshit.”

Steve could only widen his eyes at Tony’s words, but before he gathered his thoughts and took away his hurt face, Peter decided that that was the best moment to intercede. 

“Enough!”

As if slapped, both Tony and Steve turned to look at their son, who was looking at them with a mix of annoyance, hurt and exasperation. A look only a teenager could muster, and it made Tony look down for a second in shame.

“I know I don’t have all the details of what happened in Siberia, but I do have a lot of information to start guessing what happened between you two.” Peter explained to them in a stern voice.

“Peter-” Steve tried to intervene.

“Don’t, it’s my turn and you promised you were going to listen.” Peter shut his pop down immediately and Steve smartly closed his trap. Tony had to resist to make a jab at Steve’s compliance so not to risk getting scolded as well.

“You abandoned us for months, pops.” Peter accused Steve, “You decided not to let dad help you find your friend, hid things from him and disappeared for months to look for him with Uncle Sam,” he enlisted with his fingers, “That’s all fact. So, _ of course _ dad is going to think you were cheating on him and that was the reason you didn’t want him to get involved in finding your friend.”

“Peter, that’s-”

“True,” Peter finished for him without any mercy, “I’m not trying to put words in your mouth, I’m just telling you what you did before all this Registration Act happened and what dad probably felt.”

“Pete-” Tony tried to stop his son from telling Steve more. It seemed that his lack of communication skills was annoying his son enough to actually voice some of the feelings that  _ were  _ going through his mind all those months ago. His kid had known how he felt better than he had...

“I’m sorry.”

It was Steve that spoke this time, and this time, the apology was directed to both of them. Tony decided to keep his focus on his amazing kid as he softened his gaze to look at his pops.

“I know you are, pops,” Peter agreed easily, “But you can’t downplay what you did, because it won’t help you make things right with dad, or me. You have to understand that things only got worse for dad when you were indirectly attacking him politically when he was trying to keep you out of jail, and then? Suddenly dad’s figuring out that not only you were cheating on him, but your supposed lover was the one that killed his parents...”

Both Tony and Steve stood there silently. This was probably what a calm conversation with Steve would look like, but he was too involved to ever express himself like that with his ex-husband that had hurt him so much. It should be embarrassing that his teenage son was the one expressing his frustration in his stead, but for some reason, it wasn’t.

“Pops… you were trying to protect both dad and your friend so much that you focused too much on the one you thought needed you the most, but that wasn’t fair to dad, okay? You should have trusted him with the truth, you should have trusted us both in how much we can  _ help you _ and in how much we love you.” Peter finished in a beratting tone, “You’re the reason why dad was so easily manipulated and had been for all the months that you were missing looking for your friend.”

His son was implying that Tony still loved Steve, and he didn’t. He didn’t. Or at least, he needed more time to process that so that his heart gets the memmo and finally it stops beating as fast as it was at the moment.

“And, dad,” suddenly, Tony felt the full force of Peter’s berating, “Pops was  _ not cheating _ on you, he is still stupidly in love with you and you’re  _ divorced _ . He was just trying to avoid hurting you from the truth because he didn’t want you to hate his best friend on sight for something that it wasn’t his fault, so he thought that he could do it all by himself and all parties would be dandy” Peter declared, “It was a stupid plan and for someone thats supposedly a genius strategist, it was frankly ridiculus; it played right into your insecurities and your abandonment issues, I know. But he is not going to stop loving you, dad, neither will I, so I ask you to look at his side of the story more objectively as I’m sure you can do it if only you could put aside the fact that you don’t believe that pops really loves you for a second. The reason you were so easily manipulated is because you didn’t trust pops’ love for you and maybe you never fully have.”

Ouch.

So this is what Steve was feeling when it had been his turn.

“This is both’s fault,” Peter sentenced with finality, “Maybe in different levels,” he said this looking directly at Steve, “and you both have to work on your communication skills. You’re adults and the fact that you care so much for each other should mean something to you.”

Without being able to help it, Tony gave into the desire to look at his ex-husband, who was doing the same thing. He found an intensity of various feelings roaming around Steve’s blue eyes; so many that Tony couldn’t decipher what he was feeling.

“Now,” Peter continued after letting it all settle into his parents’ think skulls, “I do not condone violence between you two, and the fact that I found dad beaten, battered and freezing in the middle of Siberia is something I can’t forgive, pops, no matter how much I love you.”

“I understand,” Steve said in a defeated tone.

“I also understand that with our profession, this is a family of superheroes…” Peter continued tentatively, looking at his pops defeated stance with a little regret. He has always been soft-hearted, a trait Tony had always been proud of his boy for, “I understand we surround ourselves with violence and we inflict it as a last resort to protect people.”

“Pops, I want to believe that you beated dad up as a last resort and as a way to protect your friend…” Peter whispered with so much fragile hope that Tony couldn’t help but to place a supportive hand on his son’s shoulder. Not intrusive or with any force, but to let him know that he was there.

“Peter, I swear that was the case.” Steve stated with the most confident voice Tony had ever heard of him. He also seemed to be unable to resist comforting Peter and also placed his hand on Peter’s other shoulder. Then, Steve turned to Tony, “You both have to believe me; it was never my intention to hurt you, Tony. I really just wanted to stop you from killing Bucky; I wanted to protect your spirit as well. If you had killed Bucky, you would have regretted it with time. You are not a killer, Tony, unlike me. That is why you left the weapons’ business and that’s why you became a superhero. Me? I became a superhero in order to kill people, enemies, in war.”

Even Tony couldn’t let that train of thought inside of Steve’s head continue.

“That’s not-”

“It is. It’s true,” Steve confessed. It seemed that today was the day for the three of them to let hidden feelings come out at last. Steve saying all this in front of Peter could only mean that, after today, he was looking at his son as an adult for the first time, “I was created to become a soldier. It’s true that I wanted to fight injustice and that’s why I enlisted, but in the end, I was there to kill nazis and win a war. I got used to it and I thought I was doing the right thing.”

“But a true superhero shouldn’t be defined by frontiers nor where I was born.” Steve said regretfully, “I woke up to realize that we won the war, but we also had bombed two cities and killed hundreds of thousands of civilians just to prove a point. We weren’t any less bullies than the nazis we fought.”

“Pops...”

“That’s why I was attracted to your father the first time I read about Gulmira. He really just wanted to make a difference, no matter which part of the world.” Steve turned to a speechless Tony, “Stark Industries helps people all around the world because you want to make as much of a difference as possible; you were a better superhero than I ever will be even before I woke up from the ice.”

“Steve, you-”

“And that’s why, no matter what, I couldn’t let my best friend, the one that was hurting so much because I couldn’t protect him in the war, get killed by the most generous soul I’ve ever met,” he then winked at Peter, “along our son’s, of course.”

“Then, what happened in Siberia?” Tony asked. But this time, even he was surprised at the openness in which he asked the question. He really wanted to know what had happened all those months ago in Steve’s eyes.

“I tried to stop you, sure,” Steve said, putting some distance now from Peter and Tony, “and I have to admit that I also used the knowledge that you wouldn’t hurt me, Tony, but there wasn’t much of a fight that Bucky could have done against an enraged Iron Man, you have to understand.”

Of course Tony understood, Barnes could be a supersoldier, but a bullet was a bullet to him as much as a non-modified human.

“So when we finally subdued you, I went for the arc-reactor to give us some time to escape before you replaced it and went after us.” Steve explained, “I just needed some time to think about how to help Bucky and go back and explain everything to you, but I couldn’t do that with you and Bucky in the same room, you were both very scarred about your parents’ death, so we went to Wakanda to lay low for a while, trying to influence quietly over the Registration Act’s progress into something more agreeable.”

“You mean the work  _ I’ve _ been doing alone since day one?” Tony asked sardonically, “The one we should’ve been doing together?”

“I’m really sorry, Tony,” Steve apologised once again, “I know I screwed everything up, I swear.”

“Let’s just be clear, Steve,” Tony decided to also be honest since maybe this would be the last time he spoke to Steve, “What happened inside of your fantasy-like tale wasn’t like that.”

“What do you mean?” Steve asked, yearning for more answers of how to fix all of this, no doubt. Peter decided that his intervention was over and quietly returned to the softly beeping machine to listen from a little afar.

“I mean that I genuinely thought that you were trying to chop my head off with my father’s shield,” Tony started to enlist, “I mean that you decided to break my only arc-reactor beside the one that is still inside my body since the new armor couldn’t hold a replacement reactor.”

At this, Steve looked horrified at the implications. So much that he took an involuntary step back, as if putting some distance between Tony’s words and his body. Well, boo-hoo.

“I mean that you left me with a ton of lifeless armor around me, without being able to contact anyone, let alone Friday, to come for me. I couldn’t even drag myself very far to look for some Hydra tech to help me call for  _ anyone _ because of the weight of the armor.”

“I mean that I was left in Siberia unable to move and with a shield, a lovely temperature and my thoughts for three days.”

“No.”

“Oh, yes,” Tony contradicted, “I mean that Peter was trying to track my signal for three days with no luck, finally being able to find the weak signal than my arc-reactor slash pacemaker was making, flying around with Rhodey in a desert of snow, looking for me in a grand area of possibilities.”

“Oh god, Tony...” Steve replied, looking as if he was now fighting against physically comforting him, “...I’m so sorry, I didn’t know.”

“How would you? You were otherwise preoccupied, weren’t you?” Tony asked cynically, “You just didn’t care enough.” 

“That is not true,” Steve denied vehemently, “I love you, Tony, I would never had left you if I thought you hadn’t told anyone where you were going or unable to ask for help, you have to believe me.”

“It seems that you need me to believe in a lot of things, Steve,” Tony dismissed, the wounds still too fresh to fall for Steve’s puppy eyes, “And I don’t think I have the will nor necessity to keep on believing in what we once had.”

“Tony, wait,” Steve implored as if Tony was already surrounding himself in the Iron Man armor. And maybe, metaphorically speaking, he was, “Please don’t leave me. I love you, and I know you still love me. Don’t bother to deny it.” He continued when Tony scoffed at his boldness. The nerve of this man.

“Well, someone is hopeful today,” Tony said instead. All this emotional talk and his head injury weren’t a good fit. Though, he probably only had a mild concussion or maybe he would already have done something outrageous like kiss Steve when he re-proposed. Oh god, he really had to get out of this ship.

“I am,” Steve agreed easily, “And I know this won't go away just for talking about it, Tony, I  _ know _ . But at least I know now what happened, how I made you both like I had abandoned you, about how you felt as if I chose Bucky over you.”

“Because you did,”

“Maybe I did, but not in the way that you believe, Tony,” Steve denied, gaining back the space he had put between them before, “Peter is right, I chose to help Bucky because I felt that he needed me the most, and I chose to trust that you could handle anything. And I was  _ wrong _ .”

“Well, forgive me if I-”

“Not like that, Tony, never like that,” Steve corrected promptly, understanding how his words could be misunderstood, “I will always trust you to handle anything because you can and you will. But that is not the point of a marriage. I was a terrible husband; I had no right to put everything on you and trust you to handle it; taking care of Peter, understanding my crusade for saving Bucky, the Avengers, the Registration Act, Stark Industries, the press...”

“Tony… I had no right to put everything on you and expect you to handle it while I did what I pleased. You obviously handled it great, as you always do, but that was not what I promised you in my wedding vows and  _ I’m sorry _ .”

Tony suddenly realized that Steve was holding his hands, towering over himself, still on the medical bed, but leaning towards him so that there were only a few inches of space between them. When…?

Had Tony been too entranced by Steve’s words that he hadn’t noticed his proximity? That he hadn’t noticed that a single tear went down his eye as he heard the words that he never knew were the ones he was yearning to hear since Steve had decided to look for his missing friend?

“I love you like I had never and will never love anyone,” Steve confessed, “And I hurt you deeply. I know I have no right to be forgiven, but I will ask again and again for your forgiveness as I try to make it up to you and Peter for all the pain I had caused you. You have always made me want to be better and I will be better; a better husband and a better father. Please take me back and marry me again.”

“Steve, it’s not so simple,” Tony whispered honestly. This was no fairytale. It never had been.

“I know it’s not,” Steve agreed with a nod, “It wouldn’t be me and you otherwise, remember?” the supersoldier said softly with a small smile, as if he wouldn’t have it any other way.

And maybe it was all the feelings navigating through the small room, maybe it was the calming presence of his mature son, maybe it was Steve’s touch or his loving gaze that he had missed so much. Maybe it was only his fucking head injury.

He wasn’t sure of the reason, but the words that came out of his mouth surprised even him.

“Let’s get you first reinstated into polite society and then we can talk.”

Steve’s smile could always brighten a room. It was nice to know that it still held true.

It had been the biggest fall-out of their relationship, ending in unhealed emotional cuts and even divorce.

Besides, wouldn’t Rule Number Two meant that their marriage could become stronger than ever?

Fuck, it was too early to think about that… 

_Divorce may just be a fancy word to state to the world that you had a huge fight_ , huh?

-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll be making some grammar and volcabulary adjustments this month, so please bear with me. Love ya!

**Author's Note:**

> You may know that English is not my first language and that I always post a story before any improvement or even proofreading it first (or I would never post it otherwise, believe me). So, I humbly ask your assistance in letting me know if you find any grammar, pop culture or vocabulary error so that I can fix it.
> 
> Thank you so much. I can't wait to read what you think about this peace.


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